A/B: stock driver vs stock driver + EFI unlock (2026-09-10, host .224)
Question: does the EFI unlock alone give a completely untouched system
(stock 610.43.03 open module, zero patches) full compute speed?
Method
- Stock modules built from the pristine
cache/610.43.03.tar.gz
(make modules KERNEL_UNAME=6.8.0-139-generic, hash 221af479…),
swapped over the installed patched set (backed up, restored after).
- Benchmark: ProjectPhysX/OpenCL-Benchmark, one run per cell,
--device-less
full run on device 0. Raw outputs on the host: ~/ocl-{A,B,C,D}-*.txt.
- Each cell is a fresh boot;
50hx_log.txt and dmesg checked every time.
Matrix
| Cell |
Module |
EFI |
FP64 |
FP32 |
FP16 half2 |
INT8 DP4A |
Coalesc R/W |
PCIe |
| A |
patched |
no |
0.463 |
14.874 |
29.390 |
48.169 |
540.6/509.5 |
1.59/1.71 (Gen2 x4) |
| B |
patched |
yes |
— |
14.866 |
29.171 |
48.056 |
~same |
1.59/1.70 (Gen2 x4) |
| C |
stock |
no |
0.423 |
0.427 |
26.923 |
1.689 |
504.4/471.8 |
0.79/0.85 (Gen1) |
| D |
stock |
yes |
0.420 |
13.512 |
26.698 |
47.984 |
503.8/472.0 |
0.79/0.86 (Gen1) |
(TFLOP/s for FP*, TIOP/s for INT8, GB/s for memory/PCIe.)
Results
- Cell D is the headline: with zero kernel patches, the EFI unlock alone
restores full compute — FP32 0.427 → 13.512 (31.7x), DP4A 1.689 →
47.984 (28.4x). The stock driver booted the pre-unlocked state cleanly:
no Xid, no GSP RPC timeout (the masked-timeout path in patch 01 is not
needed when the state arrives pre-unlocked pre-OS).
- Cells A vs B: the EFI path is performance-neutral on top of the patched
module (deltas within run noise).
- The 50HX lock profile on this driver: FFMA-FP32 and DP4A are clamped
(~1/32, ~1/28); FP16 half2 FMA and INT32 are NOT clamped; memory
bandwidth is not clamped.
- Out of EFI scope, as designed: PCIe stays Gen1 without kernel patch 04
(cells C/D), ReBAR and RT-count likewise need the module.
- FP32 is ~10% lower with the stock module (13.5) than the patched module
(14.9); the patched-module runs also carry Gen2. Likely clock/boost
behavior under the module’s flow — not investigated further.
Rollback: patched module restored from ~/cmp50hx-all-patched-backup-1029,
verified by hash, dmesg marker (21 lines), and a clean P8 idle (zero Xid).